Road Trip

What the heck?  You'll see.

The sewing ladies and I traveled to Sackville, New Brunswick for a weekend getaway. Our destination was Moncton, but nobody really wants to stay in Moncton. It is just so isn't.

The Marshland Inn (here) was a decent place. I like our room quite a lot. Linda and I have shared numerous bedrooms over the years and worked out an amicable way to get through the unsightly moments of grooming and waking up. Antiques, cool woodwork, many original features, lots to ooh over. But not the dolls. Too many weird dolls. Why do bed and breakfast places and some inns feel the need to decorate with dolls? Or bears? Or stuffed animals of any kind?

I thought the front door hinge was pretty neat. It's an older version of the compression thingys we have today, only a lot more interesting to look at. And it has a lovely soft groan.

In the photo at the start, you see a door fan. The fan is placed directly over the entrance. Bugs are whirred away, a breeze is created at the front door, helping drafts to move through houses before air conditioners.

We popped into London-Wul, (here) a shop with knitting, rug hooking, rug punching, felting, spinning and quilting supplies. I had a lovely time at the thread table.

Next we headed to see Alex Schofield's art at a studio and it was very interesting. I love Alex's textile work, and her paintings are a dense, humourous exploration of family life crashing into the thoughts of an artist. I forgot my camera in the car and didn't realize it until we were miles away.

We hit the Art Shack next (here). It's small, but it has the best of everything.

The food was surprisingly good at every meal, the beer at the pub my favourite brand, and the bed comfy. Back at home, the bees have been subdivided into three smaller broods. One out the St. Margaret's Bay, where the queen still is alive but her little bees all died. The second one, with the queen from here has gone to a secret place and my hive. My gang is without a queen but are busy feeding a few eggs that queen jelly and soon there will be dancing in the skies as the queen has her way with a few drones.

I've been visiting other blogs, mostly DekAart (here) and copying her compositions. I've then been working through all the lessons I have had with Carla Sonheim (see side bar) and this is what I have been able to make. None of these are my design.

I followed the colour palette pretty closely, but used painter's tape to mask out the spot where the flower heads would go. This is a eureka moment for me. Carla had given us tip for a oil pastel lesson and I thought I'd give it a try here.

I've been fascinated by drawings people do while traveling. I couldn't figure out how they approached it, especially if they were also at a cafe having coffee. I took DekAart's image and worked my way through the stages. I'll need to try it for real next time, but it seems do-able, if there is cake with the coffee.

Last one for today. Two layers of watercolour, wet on wet, then a third layer of red dry-ish on dry. Then white ink from a pencil that has a retracting nib, letting out a dribble of white ink. I'm not fussy on the nib, and will try a proper nib and ink next time. White pastel in the spaces between.

I think I can start to work on my own compositions now that I feel slightly comfortable with these techniques. I do a lot more drawing in my 'Year of the Fairy' course, it's time to bring it all together.